Indonesian maid's escape bid goes awry in Malaysia

KUALA LUMPUR, June 17 (Reuters) Malaysian firemen came to the rescue of a desperate Indonesian maid clinging to a rope 12 storeys above the ground after she took fright while trying to escape from an abusive employer, newspapers said today.

Shamelin, 33, fashioned a rope from pieces of cloth tied together, threw it out of a 15th storey window, and started to climb down, but froze in terror when she realised how high up she was, the New Straits Times reported.

''My employer is a woman in her 30s and I live alone with her in the unit on the 15th floor,'' the paper quoted Shamelin, from Sumatra, as saying.

''She has a bad temper. If I make a mistake, she will starve me. She has hurt me so many times by beating me,'' the maid said.

Following months of ill-treatment, the weeping Shamelin said she could not bear it any more and decided to run away after her employer locked her in the flat and went out, according to the woman's usual custom.

Residents of the apartment block who saw Shamelin hanging from the rope alerted firemen who were in the building for a drill, and she was brought down safely.

Malaysia says about 1,200 maids flee from the homes of their Malaysian employers each month, but it does not want to legislate on working conditions though the migrants usually work long hours for low pay.

Indonesians account for about 340,000 of Malaysia's 380,000 foreign maids, with Filipinas, Thais, Vietnamese, Cambodians, Indians and Sri Lankans making up the rest.

REUTERS NY BST0837